One of the horror genre's "most widely read critics" (Rue Morgue # 68), "an accomplished film journalist" (Comic Buyer's Guide #1535), and the award-winning author of Horror Films of the 1980s (2007), The Rock and Roll Film Encyclopedia (2007) and Horror Films of the 1970s (2002), John Kenneth Muir, presents his blog on film, television and nostalgia, named one of the Top 100 Film Studies Blog on the Net.

Tuesday, January 10, 2017

The Films of 2016: The Autopsy of Jane Doe

[Beware
of Spoilers]

The
Autopsy of Jane Doe
(2016) is an exceedingly well-made horror film from director Andre Ovredal, the
talent behind one of the greatest found-footage horror movies of the last
several years: Trollhunter (2010).

Autopsy
of Jane Doe is
a completely different kind of horror film, but one that is quite effective in
its own way.

In
some under-the-surface fashion, The Autopsy of Jane Doe reads as a
perfect reflection of our current age. On a broad level it concerns people of
reason who attempt to puzzle through a problem scientifically, only to find
that reality isn’t necessarily as reasonable or rational as they had believed.

The
nightmarish-ness of the film arises from the slow-dawning realization by the
central figures -- father-son coroners -- that the laws of science, and their
experiences don’t really apply to their current situation.

They
are in unknown territory.

The
film’s opening scenes are particularly strong, as we come to understand the
modus operandi of these protagonists. We see them undertake an autopsy,
bringing all their training, knowledge, experience and even intuition to bear.
They are competent, smart, and likeable. They handle their job in a
professional, enlightened manner.

But
as the film-long autopsy continues, inexplicable events occur, reason is turned
on its head, and terror grows. Maybe “grows”
isn’t the right term. Terror “spreads.”

As
rational humans, much like the lead characters, we assume the daylight rules of
reality will always hold, but in this film, they don’t old. They are shed. Something old and terrifying controls the
levers of reality in a fashion beyond scientific comprehension.

Unfortunately,
the last act of the film -- though punctuated
by well-wrought jump scares -- doesn’t quite come off as successfully as
the great set-up suggests it should. Some of the final act exposition transmits
as overly far-fetched, and the film’s treatment of the father and son is not
likely to please those who have invested strongly in them, and their approach to
solving a problem.

Still,
by that point, the film is barreling forward (and bloodily) on its own
momentum.

“It looks like they
were trying to break out.”

At
a crime scene in Brantham, Virginia, a bloody crime scene baffles the police.
In particular, one woman, a “Jane Doe” (Olwen Kelly) is discovered half-buried
in the basement, nude, far away from the other victims.

In
an effort to learn more about what happened to her, the police transport the
corpse of Jane Doe to The Tilden Morgue and Crematorium, home of local medical
examiner, Tommy Tilden (Brian Cox) and his son, a certified medical technician,
Austin (Emile Hirsch). Tommy is a hard man to like, and still in mourning over
the death of his wife. He sees his job
as strictly to determine a “cause of death” and nothing more. He doesn’t want to get into speculation or
storytelling. Instead, he believes the condition of the corpse will reveal everything
he should know. What is real is only
what he can observe and catalog.

Austin,
meanwhile, is more imaginative. He also has a secret, which he shares with his girlfriend,
Emma (Ophelia Lovibond). Specifically, he doesn’t wish to take over the family
business.

As
tension grows between Austin and Tommy, they conduct a lengthy autopsy of Jane
Doe during a tumultuous storm. They soon
begin to encounter troubling indicators about the condition of the corpse.

As
their autopsy of Jane Doe continues, confusion turns to terror as the two men
realize that science can’t tell them the true story of the woman they are
examining.

“Everybody has a
secret. Some people are better at hiding them.”

Lately,
I’ve very much enjoyed the horror genre’s “return to basics” approach in recent
films. By that, I mean that films like The Monster (2016) and The
Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016) limit themselves in terms of the number of
characters and settings. With few characters to keep track of, and few
locations to cut from, these films concentrate on nurturing a scintillating
sense of anxiety and suspense. They can fully excavate the details of one place
-- and one time (like a forest road, or a crematorium during a storm) -- as well
as focus strongly on the foibles and contradictions of the main characters.

The
first hour of The Autopsy of Jane Doe is remarkable in the manner that it
introduces Austin and Tommy, and explains the basic routine of the
crematorium/morgue. For instance, we learn that Tommy ties bells to the feet of
the corpses he houses, just in case someone isn’t really dead.

You
can bet that this little strange fact will have significance later on, and it
does.

And
then, when the autopsy starts, we watch as Tommy takes the lead, examining the
body, and Austin writes important data down on a blackboard. Throughout these
sequences, the film is crisply edited, and the movie transmits as both smart
and unsettling. Smart, because Tommy and
Austin debate how to handle their work, and unsettling because the movie
focuses on something universal: the
treatment of a human body by the “death” industry, following death. We witness how Tommy and Austin go about
their job, and handle their “guests.” We see them move bodies, cut bodies,
house bodies, and otherwise handle those who were once like us; those who once
had life.

This
material is gruesome, and yet handled in a clinical fashion so that it appears
more intriguing than disgusting. Accordingly,
The
Autopsy of Jane Doe exists in this “ghoulish” place where the audience
is both fascinated and repelled by what it sees. You want to turn away, and you want to see
what happens next, simultaneously.

To
my surprise, the movie also features a very effective avatar for terror. Olwen
Kelly plays “Jane Doe,” the central corpse. At first the audience regards her
with fascination, wondering what could have happened to such a beautiful young
woman, and why she shows no markings of violence.

As
the movie continues, however, the motionless body becomes a mystery, and
finally, a well-developed character. She doesn’t move, breathe, or see anything
(through her blind white eyes…) and yet there is a feeling that she controls
everything. She is a powerful presence.
She is like a juggernaut, one who could “activate” at any point, and
after some time, you will find her constant presence in frame (often in the
background) grow from unsettling to downright terrifying.

The
Autopsy of Jane Doe
succeeds because it features compelling characters and a compelling central
mystery, too, but it is the bizarre nightmare quality of the film that most fascinates
me. I was reminded a bit of classic horror films such as The Wicker Man (1973),
wherein a man of distinct beliefs and rules investigates a mystery that,
finally, involves the utterly irrational.
That’s the journey that Tommy takes in the film. He goes from a position of “certainty” about
his job, to a position where knowledge and certainty can’t protect him. Instead, the irrational threatens to consume
him, and his son.

I
do feel that this is a very strong reflection of our current national mood. Many people are grappling, right now, with a simple hypothesis: what does it mean that established methodologies for predicting events and behavior (for example, polling) fail so egregiously?

The
Autopsy of Jane Doe
is about the fear of the rational man (or woman) that logic, science, facts, data
and all the evidence at hand will prove not to be useful in understanding the
word, or each other. It is about the fear of that man (or woman) as he starts
to let into his thinking -- perhaps for the first time -- the possibility of
something happening beyond all understanding and explaining.

My
post-mortem on The Autopsy of Jane Doe would go something like this: The film
features real life horror (showing us the process a body goes through in an
autopsy), and existential, cerebral horror, too, in its depiction of a
supernatural threat beyond the world of reason.The film’s strong characters, and the focus on one setting also
contribute to the overall success of the movie. Even the film’s problems
(mostly in the last act), don’t take away from the overall tenor of terror.

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About John

award-winning author of 27 books including Horror Films FAQ (2013), Horror Films of the 1990s (2011), Horror Films of the 1980s (2007), TV Year (2007), The Rock and Roll Film Encyclopedia (2007), Mercy in Her Eyes: The Films of Mira Nair (2006),, Best in Show: The Films of Christopher Guest and Company (2004), The Unseen Force: The Films of Sam Raimi (2004), An Askew View: The Films of Kevin Smith (2002), The Encyclopedia of Superheroes on Film & Television (2004), Exploring Space:1999 (1997), An Analytical Guide to TV's Battlestar Galactica (1998), Terror Television (2001), Space:1999 - The Forsaken (2003) and Horror Films of the 1970s (2002).

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